


Prelude

by SpringZephyr



Category: Inazuma Eleven
Genre: Kira Hitomiko (Background), M/M, Pre-Relationship
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-10-02
Updated: 2020-10-02
Packaged: 2021-03-07 21:40:45
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 1,592
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26744518
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/SpringZephyr/pseuds/SpringZephyr
Summary: "Bet I can learn Korean faster than you!" Suzuno challenged, not wasting any time."I already know ten words!"
Relationships: Nagumo Haruya | Burn/Suzuno Fuusuke | Gazel
Comments: 3
Kudos: 19





	Prelude

**Author's Note:**

> Based on a fanart. I didn't spend a lot of time on this one, so there may be (more) errors (than usual).

“The doorbell is ringing,” Suzuno said.

He was draped over the arm of the couch, as if waiting for Hitomiko to leave the bathroom had taken five hours instead of five minutes, and waiting had been the most boring thing he'd done all year. The television was on, but nothing interesting was playing. Suzuno had beaten all of his favorite video games too many times; none of them caught his interest anymore. “Go outside and play soccer” had lost some of its appeal, now that two of their best players were auditioning for Inazuma Japan.

Nagumo could relate to that feeling a little too well. He was laying on the other side of the couch, taking up the majority of the couch, in fact. He faked a stretch, just so he could have an excuse to poke Suzuno in the calf with his toe. It was as if heckling Suzuno was the most interesting thing he could think of doing lately, because he did it all of the time now.

“She can hear that,” Nagumo replied, watching as Hitomiko hurried into the next room.

“Bet it's your mom,” Suzuno said. “Probably here to say giving you up was the best decision of her life.”

“Jerk.”  
None of the other children would ever dare say these types of things to each other.

“At least your mom is still alive,” Suzuno grumbled, before turning his attention back to the television he had no interest in.

And that was precisely why.

At Sun Garden, none of the children ever answered the door when the doorbell rang. For a very good reason – the person ringing the doorbell was always someone wanting to speak to Seijirou or Hitomiko, someone who was an adult. On days the kids were exceptionally good, this could mean a pizza delivery person.

More commonly, it was a business associate or someone that needed to drop off a kid. Hardly any of them were adopted. Almost all of the orphans, once they'd been orphaned, learned to consider Sunshine Garden their home.

So although there was no rule stopping the children from answering the door themselves, they usually left it to Hitomiko. Whoever was on the other side was almost always more interested in talking to her anyway.

The children rarely received visitors, and for the most part, they were okay with that. The ones who'd been here for years and years had all of the friends they needed right here, at home, with them.

Today, however, was a bit different.

Nagumo poked Suzuno again after being ignored, then sighed and struggled to find a more comfortable position on the couch when he was ignored twice. The couch itself wasn't the problem. There was just so much pent up energy in his muscles, that Nagumo was starting to wonder if he would ever feel comfortable again.

Yesterday, he'd run laps around the orphanage's courtyard until his legs had felt like jelly, and still went to bed restless.

Today, his muscles were still relearning how to feel solid, and the frustrating extra energy hadn't gone away on top of that. It surged whenever Suzuno was nearby. Had been like that since shortly after the Chaos disbanded. All of a sudden, Suzuno had been finding reasons not to spend time with him again, and that was – well, that was kind of annoying, y'know?

Hitomiko answered the door as usual, and it wasn't long after that she returned to the living room, followed by a head of flowing golden hair.

"Suzuno, Nagumo," she announced, "you two have a visitor."

Nagumo was digging for earwax with his little finger, and Suzuno was already half asleep. They weren't exactly well-equipped for visitors, but as soon as they recognized who was standing next to Hitomiko, both sat up straighter. Suzuno meticulously smoothed down the front of his shirt, in an effort to make himself look more presentable.

'Screw it,' Nagumo thought.

If their 'visitor' had the misfortune of catching him wearing mismatched pajamas, flannel bottoms and a top with polka dots on it, then so be it.

Their visitor was the golden-haired boy who'd joined Raimon in the match against Diamond Dust. Captain of the Football Frontier's runner up team, the captain who'd formerly called himself a god. The one who'd taken all of their taunts in stride, before proving he had the skill to back up his old claims, and crippling their offense single-handedly.

Afuro Terumi. Aphrodi.

Soccer skill was the ultimate bargaining tool here at Sun Garden. He could have stopped by to announce he'd gotten a new puppy, and the two of them would have listened with open ears.

Instead, he said something much better:

"I'm looking for people to join a team."

“Better talk in one of your rooms,” Hitomiko advised, scanning the area for any additional ears. There weren't any right now, but if the other children found out, they wouldn't be able to spend even a second alone with one of your guests. “I'll go get the paperwork...”

“Paperwork?” Nagumo echoed.

Suzuno didn't say anything, but the way his hand curled into his bangs betrayed that he was interested.

Aphrodi refused to tell them anything else until they had a quiet place to talk, and in a wordless exchange, they chose Suzuno's room. He made his bed almost every morning. Meanwhile, Nagumo had enough dirty clothes and unfinished books lying on his floor that he would lose his soccer ball if he didn't take it outside so often. If Hitomiko weren't always preoccupied with more important things, the other children swore the state of his room would've driven her insane by now.

“My friends from Korea have a team, Fire Dragon, that's looking for new members,” Aphrodi said, after taking a seat on the floor. There was only one chair in Suzuno's room, and a bedroll, and of course Nagumo had made himself obnoxious by barging in and claiming the chair right away. “We were wondering if either of you would be interested?”

It took a moment for Nagumo to register what the blonde was offering. He and Suzuno had spent the last week commiserating over not being invited to play in the Football Frontier, and now an invitation was being dropped into their laps.

"I have a bit of Korean in my ancestry, actually…" murmured Nagumo.

"Coincidentally, so do I."

The two glanced at each other, silenced momentarily by the unexpected connection they shared.

“Take as much time to think about it as you need,” Aphrodi said. “Any normal person would be right to hesitate in the face of such a life-changing decision.”

"Bet I can learn Korean faster than you!" Suzuno challenged, not wasting any time.

"I already know ten words!"

Aphrodi smiled at their responses. Of course, if all he'd wanted were 'normal people', he wouldn't have conducted this much research and visited Sun Garden in the first place.

“Study hard,” he told them.

A few weeks later, they were on a plane to South Korea, trying to determine who had learned more by shouting at each other in badly accented Korean.

_ "I would like a glass of water!"  _ Burn yelled, much louder than necessary.

_ "They don't actually need anything," _ Aphrodi explained to the poor flight attendant, with much better pronunciation. She kept coming back to their seats, worried that they were hungry or needed to use the bathroom or were in the middle of a medical emergency, unable to understand the orphan kids' accents. “ _ Feel free to ignore them. _ ”

_ “Fish sandwich,” _ Suzuno countered.  _ “I need to use the restroom.” _

It was strange hearing the two of them speak in such polite, clipped words, even if it sounded like they were reading straight from a textbook.

“Tch.”

“ _ The book store is next to the grocery store, _ ” Suzuno continued. Even though his hand was running through his hair again, he was smirking like he knew he had the upper hand.

And as for Aphrodi, he was starting to wish he'd brought headphones with his carry on luggage. 

“ _ I would like to kiss you, _ ” Nagumo blurted out suddenly. Strangely, some of the impossible to get rid of energy he'd been feeling lately seemed to evaporate. 

He watched the confusion on Suzuno's face as he cycled through his lists of vocabulary, trying to remember if that word was one he knew. A satisfied little smirk settled on Nagumo's face. Taking the window seat before Suzuno could,  _ and _ proving he was smarter than his only rival? Best day ever.

Eventually, Suzuno scowled and gave up. “I really do have to use the bathroom before the flight starts,” he grumbled in Japanese, squeezing past Aphrodi to get out of his seat.

“Sore loser!” Nagumo called after him.

“ _ Shut up! _ ”

“Hah, you couldn't even say it right!”

“Neither could you,” Aphrodi replied with a sigh. He thought long and hard about whether he really wanted to break the silence before casting Nagumo a side-eyed glance. “So...”

“Don't make the wrong assumption,” Nagumo said. Beating Suzuno had put him in a good mood, so it wasn't like he was mad or anything. “I only said that, 'cause I knew he wouldn't know what that word meant. I won.”

“Right.”

“Besides, even if I wanted to kiss him,” Nagumo folded his arms behind his head, laying back in his chair so he was looking at the ceiling slightly, “he doesn't feel the same way.”

But for some reason, Nagumo found himself wondering what would happen if he did. The thought felt almost as good as winning their contest had.


End file.
